Mark McConville and Keith Barfield, the duo from Alabama who just finished a tour of Route 66 in a 1966 Pontiac GTO powered by compressed natural gas, is planning to do it again next year, reports the Birmingham News.
This time, McConville and Barfield are hoping others who support their efforts to lessen America’s dependence on foreign oil will join them on their self-proclaimed “Drive to Inspire” campaign.
“Our goal is to make this an annual event,” McConville said during an interview this week from the Pontiac-Oakland Club International convention in West Virginia, where his 1966 Pontiac GTO converted to use compressed natural gas is on display. […]
“Now that we have proven it can be done, that you can drive across the nation in vehicles using alternative fuel, we need to take this to the next level,” Barfield said. “We need more CNG fueling stations, we need people to do conversion of a vehicle from gasoline, or buy a CNG vehicle.”
McConville also said the response to the cross-country effort was “above and beyond what we expected,” including a CNG supplier who drove 600 miles from Salt Lake City to refuel the GTO during a dead spot in Gallup, N.M.
Here’s a video taken during the journey at POPS in Arcadia, Okla.: